Thank you Mario! But our princess is in another castle…

Tag Archives: Indigo Prophecy

So I’m cruising Gamespot the other day and I come across a review for Indigo Prophecy. Geez, that brings back memories. Sadly, my experience playing Indigo Prophecy was not as rosy as that of Gamespot’s reviewer (who gave the game an 8.4).

Don’t get me wrong–I know the game was innovative and exciting when it came out because of the branching, complex storyline, but didn’t anyone else get sick and tired of the Simon style button mashing? The whole “moving both of the analog sticks on the controller in sync with the flashing lights that appeared in the middle of your screen” bit? To me, it detracted from the story–it was hard to concentrate on the developing plot when I kept having to jump at every appearance of those Simon Says circles on my screen. Like… I’m supposed to be experiencing this dark scene in a snow-covered cemetery, but oh wait, I gotta hit up with both analog sticks at the same time NOW!

Nonetheless, I played the game for a good amount of hours and was really getting into the story… when I came up against an epic Simon Says sequence that ended with my character jumping and grabbing onto a helicopter. Well… that was what was supposed to happen, but I’d get through 7 minutes of right, right, up, down, right, left, down, down, up, up, up, R, L, R, L, R, L, R, L!!! and then I’d lose my grip on the damn helicopter. EVERY TIME. I think I tried to get this sequence done at least 2 dozen times, but I couldn’t hit the buttons on the Xbox controller fast enough at the end (the bumpers are a pain to click alternately for more than 15 seconds at a stretch), and I’d fall off the helicopter. Then I’d have to start the WHOLE SEQUENCE OVER AGAIN.

After two days of crippling hand pain, I just gave up. It sucked, too, because I had achieved the kiss scene between the lead characters and wanted to see where things were headed. (My then bf was jealous because he hadn’t gotten that outcome–I guess I’m just better with the ladies.)

A game that relies so heavily on moving the analog sticks up and down and right and left and mashing the heck out of the right and left bumpers in a long string of movements quickly just isn’t my idea of fun. Maybe if I had another chance at playing this game, I’d be able to remember all the good times I had before that crappy helicopter scene, but that bf is long gone and I wouldn’t want to shell out money for another copy of this game.